Mitsotakis confident ahead of next elex: Greece first EU country hit by populism, first to be rid of populists

Main opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Sunday promised a major renewal of his center-right New Democracy (ND) party's candidate lists for next year's general election, which cannot be held later than early October 2019.

In a wide-ranging interview published in the Sunday weekly "Proto Thema", the pro-reform and pro-market Mitsotakis also promised to seek post-election cooperation with other Parliament-represented parties, even if ND achieves an election victory that gives it an outright majority of MPs in Parliament.

ND is leading radical leftist SYRIZA party, the dominant partner in the current leftist-rightist coalition, by double-digit percentage points in practically all mainstream opinion polls for the past year and a half.

One exception, he quickly added, is any cooperation with SYRIZA.

"I will not participate in a government with SYRIZA in it. I am sure that no one will want to bring SYRIZA in through the window, when the citizens have kicked it out of the door," he was quoted as saying.

He also insisted that snap elections should be declared by his rival, PM and SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras, in case right-wing Defense Minister Panos Kammenos leaves the coalition government over his standing opposition to the provisional Prespa agreement.

Kammenos and a handful of deputies still affiliated with his rightist-populist Independent Greeks (AN.EL) party continue to prop up the mostly leftist Tsipras government.

In an earlier statement, Mitsotakis reiterated that "Greece was the first EU country afflicted with populism, and it will be the first to be relieved of the populists."